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Former Royal Exchange Hotel, 300-308 Victoria Street, North Melbourne

Allom Lovell & Associates, 1981-2005Jul-99

Record details

Title:

Creator:

Allom Lovell & Associates, 1981-2005

Date of work:

Jul-99

Reference number:

109830

Level of description:

Item from Collection: Heritage Collection (HC)

Type of materials:

Graphic materials

Part of:

Series: North Melbourne and West Melbourne (BIF-NORTH)

Access restrictions:

UnrestrictedOpen access

Use restrictions:

Refer to individual item records for Use Restrictions.Please contact City of Melbourne Libraries about obtaining permission to reproduce images.

General notes:

Grading as at 1999 : DPeriod : Early Victorian, Inter war, Moderne (1870)The rate books for 1870 indicate that Cornelius O'Leary, a grocer, owned a four-room brick 'corner shop' on Victoria Streets. The following year, a nine-room 'brick public house and bar' had been erected on the site, with O'Leary listed as both owner and hotelkeeper. By 1875, the latter position had been taken over by Joseph Williams. Several other publicans followed, although O'Leary had returned to the post by 1891. He appears to have died a few years later; from 1896, the owner of the hotel was listed as the "O'Leary Estate".IN the early twentieth century, the hot3el was owned and operated by various members of the Lording family, and later by Andrew Oastler. The Sands & McDougall Directory indicates that A J Hehir became the publican in the mid 1930s, Succeeded by Mrs H E McKenzie around 1939. Either of these operators may have been responsible for remodelling or rebuilding the hotel in the present Moderne-style appearanceIt is a double-storey rendered brick Victorian hotel, remodelled in the inter-War Modern style. The splayed corner has a porch with a glazed entrance door at ground level and a blind window at first floor level. A second porch is located at the east end of the building providing access to the first floor areas. The original ground floor windows have been replaced by large fixed panes, while the windows to the first floor are paired or single timber-framed double-hung sashes. Three rendered string courses run the length of the two street facades. The roof is concealed behind a plain parapet.It is of local historical and aesthetic interest. Although altered in the 1930s like most suburban hotels, the building provides evidence of a hotel business which operated from this site, and under the same name, from 1871. Aesthetically, its façade is typical of the inter-War Modern style. The building is an interesting element in the Peel and Victoria Streets streetscapes, lending landmark qualities to this prominent corner site. The 1930s hotel signage has been retained.The above notes are from the Heritage Review. However, Cornelius O'Leary died in 1902, so the publican may have been another member of the family. The Lording family were prominent in North Melbourne and the football world.

Names:

City of Melbourne

Topics: